Eleven (11 page)

I paced, my skin jumping from nerves. I had stood my ground with a serial killer. “He mentioned connection when it comes to the pictures. Those people mean something to him. I believe the fact he came back with,
you think you know someone
, was his way of confirming he likes to be influential, just as you accused him of. I believe both connecting and influence mean the same thing to this guy. He’s not capable of a relationship unless he’s able to manipulate it.”

“He’s not remorseful even for Sally, and we know that he knew her. In fact, he’s void of emotion except for pride which surfaces when discussing the victims.”

“And yesterday, when the truth came out that one of the murders happened while he was in here, he was proud. And did you see his face when you called him The Redeemer?” When I stopped talking, silence ate the space between us before I spoke again. “Okay, let’s assume Bingham has a photo of Sally. We know he didn’t have it at the time of booking, so how did he get it?”

Jack addressed the guard. “We need to speak with the warden again.”

“Course.” The guard’s voice was deeper than one would expect given his smaller stature. He took us through the labyrinth of corridors, which we were unfortunately becoming familiar with.

Clarence Moore looked up from his monitor to us in the doorway. “They asked to see you,” the guard said, slinking back into the hallway.

Moore stood. “Agents? I thought I had provided everything you asked for.”

“We need to see Bingham’s cell.”

Moore tossed a pen he held in his hand to the desk. “I’m not sure what y’all think it’s going to tell ya. But I can take ya there.”

Moore still didn’t know the details of our investigation, and it was better that way. The fewer people who knew, the less possibility there was of it leaking to the media and in turn reaching the unsub.

Minutes later we were stepping into The Redeemer’s cell. As Moore informed us, he shared the space with an inmate by the name of Tim Johnson. Johnson had been put away for armed B&E that had him holding a gun on the homeowner.

Bingham hadn’t returned from his trip down the hall, but his cellmate was sitting on the mattress picking at his fingernails. He didn’t move when our shadows broke his light.

“Johnson, out!” The guard bellowed. Johnson kept picking at his nails. “Don’t make me come in there an’ drag yo’ ass out!”

Johnson stopped moving, and with his eyes on us, rose to his feet. He turned around and held his hands behind his back.

The guard made it to Johnson in a few long strides and cuffed his hands. “You think yo’ so fuckin’ smart.”

“Ass-ault.” Johnson laughed as if he was drunk.

The guard pulled on him and took him to the hall.

“Did you see that? Ass-ault.” Johnson only stopped cackling long enough to repeat himself.

A look passed between the guard and Johnson. This time Johnson shut up.

Jack went into the cell first. Johnson was on the bottom bunk which meant Bingham would have crashed on the upper one.

Beside
Johnson’s mattress, there was a crayon drawing of a girl in a triangle dress with a stick-figure dog beside her. Green strokes made for grass under their feet, and the words,
I love you, Daddy
, were scribbled on it.

I turned to face Johnson, who was looking down the hallway as if scheming a run for freedom. If he had a child, why would he risk everything to wind up here?

Jack looked at the ceiling of the cell, hunched and looked behind the urinal and under the sink. He snapped on a pair of latex gloves and pulled out Johnson’s mattress. He looked behind it, underneath it, around it. In this medium security prison, the mattresses came free of the metal frame. He lifted up a paperback novel. The cover showed a hand holding a gun. I shook my head. That was what had landed him here in the first place. Jack put it back in place, the mattress on top of it.

I put gloves on and went to slide a hand under the edge of the top mattress. Jack pulled my arm back. “Don’t ever go in blind.”

His sour expression and the warning in his words halted my movements.

“You lift that end. I’ll lift down the other.”

I followed Jack’s directions, and the mattress was on the floor seconds later.

I stepped up on the railing of the bottom bunk to get a good view. What I saw made my pulse speed up. “There’s a lot up here.”

Jack hoisted up on the frame of the bottom bunk. “Good thing I stopped you, Kid.” He held up a small razor.

“Where would he have—”

Jack angled it. “It’s from shaving.”

“They let them have razors?”

“Medium security. Just like they’re allowed playtime in the yard, on the Internet, and in the library.” Jack took a dig at the justice system, the same one he stood to defend. “He broke the blade from the holder. He probably has a system worked out. Usually inmates are allowed to purchase razors but have to return the dull ones to get new ones.”

“That’s reassuring.” I rubbed my stomach, thinking back to the victims and how they suffered. “Arm a serial killer with his ideal weapon.”

It went silent between us for a few seconds as we looked over the rest of what lay exposed on the metal slab. There was a King James Version of the Bible along with a book on the history and meaning of the coinherence symbol. All I could think is how Zachery would never let us hear the end of it once he knew his theory had complete merit, possibly even factoring into the killings. But, even though, the two books were dog-eared and had worn edges, what had our attention was the spread of photographs.

“Where would he have gotten all of these?” I asked.

“His apprentice.” A smile cracked Jack’s lips, and with the expression came the realization he only seemed amused when it was at my expense.

“Thought we were going with follower now.”

“It’s all right, Kid. Don’t get all excited.”

There were easily twelve photos on the metal surface. They were of a mix of men and women, just the way he preferred to kill, in alternating sexes. Most of them were unfamiliar faces.

“The Sarasota murders?”

Jack held one up of a young woman.

“Sally Windermere.”

Jack let out a rush of air. “You might be able to make good on your promise yet.”

In a way, I didn’t want to be right in this instance. I hoped that Sally had fallen in love with someone new and taken off, even though logic dictated the odds of that were minimal. Coinciding with logic was the reality that Sally Windermere may have been victim number ten, the result of Bingham’s follower, the one free to kill again.

“We’ll need to find out where he got these photos. Someone from the outside world brought them to him.”

Jack stepped off the bed rail and moved to the guard who held onto Tim Johnson. “Take him somewhere else for a bit.”

“Where—”

“Don’t care really. But we’ll be taking all this shit with us.”

The guard let out a sigh and pushed Johnson down the corridor ahead of him.

With them gone, Jack was silent. His eyes were taking in the space, and he was analyzing everything.

“These pictures are probably of his other victims, the murders from Sarasota,” I repeated my earlier statement.

“Bet you they are.”

We found Clarence Moore behind his desk. His hand moved a pen rapidly across a page. A flick of a wrist, a few loops of ink, and the sheet was turned over and placed on top of a pile to his right. He looked up at us when we entered his office.

He gestured for us to sit across from him. “I heard you found items of interest.”

Jack nodded. “We’ll be taking all of it with us.”

Moore clasped his hands and leaned across his desk. “What do ya want with a man like Bingham anyhow?”

We had never given Moore the truth of the investigation. All he knew was the FBI had their attention on Lance Bingham, and it involved more than the murder of cattle.

Jack glanced at me as if to say,
pay attention
. “The details of our investigation are of the utmost sensitivity. There is a media ban in place, and should you leak any of the information we give you, you will be punishable by the law. Do you understand that?”

A slow nod.

“Lance Bingham is a serial killer.”

It had Moore reaching for his water bottle. He took a swig and wiped his mouth with the back of his hands. His eyes peered straight ahead. “What is he doing here then? We’re only a me-medium security prison. We ain’t equipped to deal with—”

“We still have to prove it.”

“You still have to prove it?” Moore repeated the words in question form.

“Ten bodies were found under his property.”

“No way. Lance isn’t that smart.”

“People are not who they project, especially serial killers.”

With the term serial killer
being used again, Moore’s eyes moistened not from fear but I suspected from intrigue.

“We’ll be taking what we found in his cell,” Jack repeated his earlier statement. “We also need to be informed when he gets mail and what he’s received. Is this something that you can handle?”

“Course. All prisoner mail is opened, and the contents checked.”

“We’d like to be the ones to give final approval on whether it gets delivered to him.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“We need you to figure it out.” Jack kept eye contact with Moore.

Moore picked up the pen and scribbled something in a notepad. His handwriting angled to the left and was tightly compressed letters. I looked at the writing on the form he was working on when we interrupted him. There it was larger with more swirls. This change showed that Moore had closed emotionally from what we told him.

“When was the last time he received mail?”

“If you’d excuse me for a moment.” Moore picked up the telephone receiver and hit a few buttons. He spoke into the receiver, “Anita, I need to know the last time inmate,” Moore rhymed off a number. “That’s right, Lance Bingham. When did he last receive mail?” Moore cupped the receiver and said to us, “It should only take her a few sec—” He spoke back into the receiver, “Today...okay and it hasn’t been distributed yet?” Moore shot a glance at Jack.

“Have her bring today’s mail to us.”

“I need you to bring it to my office...yes...I know it’s not the norm...thank you.” Moore hung up. “That was the mailroom supervisor, and she’ll be here in a few minutes with it. She had said the last package before today was March ’08.”

Sally Windermere went missing February eleventh, 2008. Bingham was booked in January of that same year.

“She’ll need to know the details of your investigation as well.”

“Not going to happen. And you’re not going to tell her either. The fewer people who know, the better.”

“But if we have him in pr-prison, what is the big deal? What is the leak y’all are worried about?”

Jack relayed the fact we suspected the use of Twitter to communicate with another killer.

“We’ll remove his right to access the Internet.”

“You’ll leave everything the way it is. If you take the privilege away, it will only tip off the unsub and make them run. Did she say what type of package came in today?”